gulfofmainebooks

Friday, November 05, 2010

seasonal newsletter

Friends,Welcome to our Holoiday newsletter.As Gulf of Maine Books enters our 32nd Holiday season, we want to let you know about things happening at the store, and about some of the new books about which we are excited this season.

We will be open seven days a week from the day following Thanksgiving until Christmas Eve, with a series of readings on Sunday afternoons at 4 PM:

Sunday, Dec. 19, 5 PM - Phil Hoose will be signing books and singing songs to celebrate the paperback release of his National Book Award winng boook for kids Claudette Colvin - books, food, music and Phil!

We recently went to the Frankfort (Germany) Book Fair, the largest book fair in the world. At the fair Beth ordered some nice German advent calendars, as well as a beautiful line of handmade blank journals from Florence, Italy, which are now on the shelves here.

Margaret Leonard has just put up a new show of over 30 paintings, here in the store, so look up when you come in.

With the idea of buying local in mind, we want to recommend a number of books for children by local authors: Cynthia Lord's Touch Blue, and also Hot Rod Hamster, Janet Bonney's Martha To The Rescue, Charlotte Agell's Accidental Adventures of India McAllister, Chris van Dusen's Circus Ship, and also Learning to Ski with Mr. Magee, Maria Padian's paperback Brett McCarthy:Work in Progress, Phil Hoose's Claudette Colvin in paperback, Robin Hansen's Ice Harbor Mittens, Sandra Dutton's Mary Mae and the Gospel Truth, Calef Brown's Hallowilloween, Katie Clark's Grandma Drove the Snowplow, and seven titles by Dahlov Ipcar. (plus copies of Children Make Terrible Pets by Peter Brown)

In the Maine section we have Stephen Petroff's Artifacts of Ice Age Maine - Tales of Growing Up in Bowdoinham and Beyond, Susie Moran's House at Bunganuc Landing, a new History of Harpswell, Robert P T Coffin's Christmas in Maine,Paul Doiron's novel The Poacher's Son, Crash Barry's new novel Sex, Drugs and Blueberries, The Hard Way Around - a Joshua Slocum biography by Geoffrey Wolff of Bath,Beginner's Grace by Kate Braestrup, Maine Farms at Work - a lovely book from the Maine Farmland Trust with photos by Bridget Besaw, Well Out to Sea - year round on Matinicus Island by Eva Murray, Dis Place - a true history of Malaga Island by Matt Herrick, and a new lovely Geology of Baxter State Park and Mount Katahdin.

In the nature section we have James Prosek's wonderful new book Eels (he will be speaking in Brunswick in January for the Friends of Merrymeeting Bay) the Edward Abbey issue of Matter magazine, David Abrams' new Becoming Animal - an Earthly Cosmology, Elizabeth Tova Bailey's Sound of a Wild Snail Eating, the story of Wesley the Owl, Wendell Berry's Imagination in Place (also his book Leavings, and his new story for children: Whitefoot - A Story from the Center of the World) Tom Wessels' Forest Forensics - A field guide to reading the forested landscape, a new Field Guide to Feathers, and A Spicing of Birds - a beautiful book of poems by Emily Dickinson with 19th century bird illustrations.

In hardcover fiction we have Lily King's new Father of the Rain, Sara Gruen's Ape House (and if she gets you interested in Bonobos we have three non fiction books she recommends: Bonobo Handshake, Kanzi - Ape at the brink of the human mind, and Next of Kin - my conversations with the chimpanzees) also Exley by Brock Clarke (new to the Bowdoin Dept. of English),Salman Rushdie's Luka and the Fire of Life, Jaimy Gordon's Lords of Misrule, John Casey's Compass Rose, David Mitchell's Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet, What Is Left the Daughter by Howard Norman,John le Carre's Our Kind of Traitor, Paul Auster's Sunset Park, Nicole Krauss' Great House, Lydia Davis' new translation of Madame Bovary, Freedom by Jonathan Franzen, The Sisters from Hardscrabble Bay by Beverly Jensen, Ken Follett's Fall of Giants, Philip Roth's Nemesis, Thomas McGuane's Living on the Rim, Dennis Lahane's Moonlight Mile, and Squirrel Seeks Chipmunk - animal stories by David Sedaris.

In paperback fiction we have Will Bonsall's Through the Eyes of A Stranger, Debra Spark's Good For the Jews, Eileen Myles' The Inferno, Barbara Kingsolver's Lacuna, Lorrie Moore's Gate at the Stairs, Half Broke Horses by Jeanette Walls, Cutting for Stone by Abraham Verghese, The Zone by Mathias Enard (gary's favorite novel this year!) Chris Abani's Graceland, A S Byatt's Children's Book,Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel, Paul Harding's Tinkers, Edible Stories by Mark Kurlansky and Colum McCann's Let the Great World Spin (We also recommend two other title by him - Zoli and Dancer).

We hope that you will visit the store during the holiday season, and we wish you Happy Holidays, Happy Solstice, and a wonderful New Year!Beth and GaryGulf of Maine Books

About Me

Gulf of Maine Books is an independent alternative bookstore in Brunswick, Maine, founded in 1979 by Beth Leonard and Gary Lawless and still going strong!We are open Monday through Saturday, 930-530, and our phone is 207-729-5083. Our email address is: gulfofmainebooks@gmail.com